Quote of the Day (Rick Perry, with Loose, “Treacherous…Treasonous” Talk)

"If this guy prints more money between now and the election, I don't know what y'all would do to him in Iowa. I mean, printing more money to play politics at this particular time in American history is almost treacherous – or treasonous, in my opinion.”—Texas Governor—and new Presidential candidate—Rick Perry, on Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, quoted in Abby Phillip, “Thrust and Perry: W.H. to Texan: Watch Your Mouth,” Politico, August 16, 2011

I know what you’re thinking: It’s been a long day, and you’re tired. You don’t want to wade through all of this Texas-sized bullchip.

Well, neither do I. But when a newly announced candidate--one, be it noted, from a large state, with a considerable war chest, amid an uncertain economy and, therefore, not only with a terrific chance of winning his party's nomination but of taking the general election in 2012--comes out with the kind of blathering above, we’d all better sit up straight and try to make sense out of it all.

If Texas Governor Rick Perry believes every word of this stuff, all the time, he’s an idiot. If he doesn’t, he’s the worst kind of demagogue. If he starts out not believing it but persuades himself, while delivering it, that he does, he should forsake the stump for the stage immediately.

What does Perry mean by “playing politics”? Is he implying that Ben Bernanke wants President Obama re-elected? Why would that be?

Start out with a fact, a not unimportant one: Ben Bernanke was appointed head of the Fed by George W. Bush. You remember him, right, Rick? A Republican? Not just that, but a conservative one? Oh, and one more hint: your predecessor as governor?

In other words, Bernanke’s appointment was pushed by a President not only dedicated to free-market principles, but one who barely displayed any interest in appointing Democrats to any office during his two Presidential terms, particularly in as high-profile as the one at the Fed. Maybe it was Bernanke’s academic background that led Perry to suspect Bernanke of being a crypto-liberal Democrat.

But there’s another little matter in Perry’s statement: those words “almost treacherous--or treasonous, in my opinion.” Some would question the wisdom of exciting the fevered brain of some talk-radio-addicted yahoo in a state with laws that look kindly on concealed handguns (like Texas!). Just imagine if said yahoo gets anywhere within the vicinity of Bernanke the next time he appears in the Lone Star State. Better yet, don’t.

But leave aside all of this. If Bernanke’s actions at the Fed are close to “treasonous,” what do you say about a governor who has speculated that his state could legally secede from the Union? That he is unworthy to follow in the footsteps of the first (great) GOP President, who told an audience that “as a nation of freemen we must live for all time, or die by suicide”? That he is summoning a dark past of anti-majoritarianism, recalcitrant racism and endless effusion of blood? That those 19th-century advocates of secession, Confederate Lost Cause mythology to the contrary, were guilty of treason? That thus, even before he can run in a single primary, Governor Perry has called into question whether he intends to fulfill the traditional Presidential inaugural pledge to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States“?